The increasing popularity of the Internet almost seems to correspond with a decreasing understanding of copyright law. Copyright means that the creator holds the rights to distribute his creation, and must be specifically asked for permission to use it unless it is part of the public domain. Educators, however, are allowed to use some copyrighted material if they follow the terms of Fair Use.
How Much is Permitted Without Specific Permission
Fair Use allows teachers and students to copy certain amounts of text based material for classroom use. A chapter of a book can be copied if only one copy is made, or if multiple copies are made and represent less than 10% or 1000 words of the book. Newspaper articles and other short writings, including web based works, follow the same rules as a chapter, though complete copies can be made if the work is less than 2,500 words. Poems can be copied in entirety if they are 250 words or less, otherwise only an excerpt of 250 words may be used.
Music and graphics follow slightly different rules. Music, unless part of the public domain, can only have 10% of the work copied, which includes print and audio forms. Graphics, including artwork, photographs, cartoons and charts, may be used in their entirety but not more than 5 from any one creator or 15% of a collection may be used each time.
Multimedia, such as film, video and broadcasts, are simpler. Broadcasts may be recorded and used in the classroom for up to 45 days after being recorded, but then must be destroyed. All others may be used if only 3 minutes or up to 10% of the original.
In all cases the material must be accompanied by copyright information. It also may be used for up to 2 years, with the exception of broadcasts, without specific permission from each copyright holder.
How Copyright Affects Multimedia Created in the Classroom
One of the more common places in a classroom to use copyrighted material is in student or teacher created multimedia presentation. Students may use copyrighted material for classroom assignments and educational projects following the above stated fair use guidelines. Teachers may create presentations for classroom and conference use, but any posted online for distance education purposes must be protected from being copied or removed within 15 days of its posting. Additionally, students and teachers may include their work in a work related portfolio for longer than two years.
Teachers need to understand what is allowed in order to teach students about what can and cannot be done when creating multimedia presentations. They also need to be aware of what is considered fair use for educational purposes and how that extends to what they create for use in the classroom.
References: Fair Use and Copyright for Teachers.
To read a copy of the guidelines from the Consortium of College and University Media Centers, visit: Fair Use Guidelines for Educational Multimedia
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